Sorry I’m late everyone, but my wife told me this morning that we were having dinner with the in-laws at six, so we didn’t get home until, oh, three minutes ago.

If it makes any difference, I’m sorry we didn’t get to experience the first three minutes of the first quarter together.

Alright, as the Southern Miss boots the ball away on the punt and the rain continues to fall at 8:16, let’s chat a little. First, my name is Brian and I’m from One More Dying Quail – according to Technorati, I’m one of the 416,000 best blogs on the Internet, so I’ve got that going for me. I’ll be your host for this evening’s debacle featuring the Frank Solich-led Ohio Bobcats against Brett Favre’s alma mater, the Southern Miss Golden Eagles. And that is officially all I know about these two teams.

They’re telling us that the weather tonight will be poor (it’s already raining pretty good down in JaMarcus Russell’s hometown of Mobile, Alabama – there is a tornado warning in effect.

If the game clock is any indication, I typed all of the above in about forty-five seconds. I’m good.

Oh, a word of warning: not sure if we’ll be going with the separate threads for each quarter on this one. I think it depends on how extensive this gets – if those tornadoes arrive, it could be a real early night.

Thanks STN – that answers the question of who the hell is calling this thing. I might type 17,000 words per minute, but I’m not good enough to recognize announcers’ voices. It’s a character flaw, and I’m working on it.

8:25 – Hey, while I’m on it – how about a huge hand for Awful Announcing, Signal to Noise, Run Up The Score, and Sam T for some amazing live blogs this weekend? You guys are awesome – I’m proud to be a part of this. No, I’m not crying – it’s dusty in here.

8:27 – Is it bad that I’m in “fourth quarter blow-out mode”, and we’re not even halfway through the first quarter?

8:28 – “GMAC is proud to be the sponsor of the GMAC Bowl” – well, they’re certainly paying enough for it. They probably wouldn’t be as proud to be the sponsor of the International Bowl or anything like that.

8:30 – Signal to Noise said…Andre Ware is the color guy — once again proving that if you were ANYONE in college football, never mind if your career afterward sucked, ESPN will hire you. I still say Erin Andrews should be shipped to all college football games.

Thank you again, STN – you’re kinda like my sideline reporter for this one. As for Erin Andrews – she should be the sideline reporter for my life, just so I can look at her every day.

8:32 – “The eyes are still down the field, which allows him to make the play.” – Ware. It’s so difficult to make plays when you’re looking behind you.

8:33 – “Stay in the middle of the field, because Fletcher can hit it anywhere.” – Ware. I wonder if Damion Fletcher uses that as a pick-up line when he’s talking to the ladies.

8:36 – Sam T said…this question is kinda old, but do you guys remember the “that’s kinda gay” guy from some college game in like October? Where is he now?Oh yeah, THAT guy…he’s probably fetching coffee for Chris Berman or shining Lee Corso’s shoes at this point.

8:38 – True story: I have typed every comment for the last eight minutes without once glancing at the screen. Thank you, Andre Ware.

8:40 – Every other bowl I’ve watched has featured the CEO or comparable figure of the sponsoring company in some sort of set piece, talking about how happy they are to be sponsoring the game and blah blah blah. For GMAC, they give the CEO a microphone on the sideline, throw in a kid who may or may not be his (regardless of what he said), and let him have at it. It’s a nice idea, because it actually shows that the CEO is at and cares about the game, but at the same time, it looks a little shoddy – like they realized five minutes ago that they hadn’t shot one of those mini-commercials and decided to just hand him the microphone.

8:45 – AwfulAnnouncing- said… Ummm….can someone score please? I think the 84 people who came in the last hour are crying by now.If people are crying, AA, it probably has more to do with my writing ability than the game. I HAVE been known to move people to tears with my words.

8:46 – You know what – screw it. I’m starting a new thread for the second quarter. Meet me over there.